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Big Books of the Week

The Paris Apartment by Lucy Foley (Morrow) leads holds this week.

Other titles in demand include:

Nothing to Lose by J. A. Jance (Morrow)

Caramel Pecan Roll Murder by Joanne Fluke (Kensington)

The Swimmers by Julie Otsuka (Knopf; LJ starred review)

The Verifiers by Jane Pek (Vintage)

These books and others publishing the week of Feb. 21st, 2022 are listed in a downloadable spreadsheet.

Awards, Events, & New Memoirs

Britney Spears signs a $15 million tell-all memoir deal with Simon & Schuster. People has the story. EW also has coverage, as does Variety.

Elliot Page signs a $3 Million+ deal for his memoir, Pageboy, to be published by Flatiron. Deadline reports.

Mary Robinette Kowal wins the 2022 Edward E. Smith Memorial Award for Imaginative Fiction (AKA the Skylark Award). Locus has details.

World Book Day is March 3rd, 2022. 

Librarians and Booksellers Suggest

Three LibraryReads and four Indie Next picks publish this week:

The Paris Apartment by Lucy Foley (Morrow)

“Foley hits it out of the ballpark with this solid thriller set in a Paris apartment building. Jess goes looking for her brother, but finds only the smell of bleach and a broken St. Christopher medal lodged in the floorboards. Written in short chapters with multiple points of view and delicious secrets dropped along the way, this gripping, wild ride is impossible to put down. If you like Liane Moriarty or Ruth Ware, pick this one up.“—Douglas Beatty, Baltimore County Public Library, Baltimore, MD

It is also an Indie Next pick:

“This novel is a slow burn with a twist ending you can't see coming! The story layers perfectly as secrets rise to the surface, and Paris serves as a beautiful and mysterious backdrop.”—Addy Bowman, Wild Geese Bookshop, Franklin, IN

Delilah Green Doesn't Care by Ashley Herring Blake (Berkley; LJ starred review)

“As a teen, Delilah felt ostracized after her father died. When she reluctantly returns to her hometown for her stepsister’s wedding, she meets Claire, one of a group of girls who Mean Girled her in high school. An absolute delight of a queer romance, women’s fiction with insta-attraction, forced proximity, family drama, and cute kid moments. For fans of Something to Talk About and Red, White, & Royal Blue.”—Laura Eckert, Clermont County Public Library, Milford, OH

It is also an Indie Next pick:

“What a pleasure to enjoy Ashley Herring Blake's layered characters in an adult novel after all her books for kids and teens. Every story beat lands and Claire and Delilah were easy to root for. More romances set in this community, please!”—Cecilia Cackley, East City Bookshop, Washington, DC

The Verifiers by Jane Pek (Vintage)

“Claudia Lin, a lifelong reader of mystery novels, may be getting in over her head when she decides to investigate a mysterious death connected to the online dating detective agency where she works. Well-developed characters and an engaging locked room plot make this a great pick for those who loved Arsenic and Adobo and Dial A For Aunties.”—Mara Bandy Fass, Champaign Public Library, Champaign, IL

It is also an Indie Next pick:

“Set in the age of internet dating, Claudia Lin investigates the murder of one of her firm’s clients. Jane Pek weaves issues of technology, privacy, cultural identity, and a warm family story. Let's hope this is the start of a new series!”—Jane Stiles, Wellesley Books, Wellesley, MA

One additional Indie Next selection publishes this week:

The Swimmers by Julie Otsuka (Knopf; LJ starred review)

“Emotional and moving, The Swimmers shows the world through a wide-angle lens, slowly narrowing focus until the image disappears completely. A beautiful, poetic novel of a mother and a daughter, of culture, loss, guilt, and grief.”—Betsy Von Kerens, The Bookworm of Omaha, Omaha, NE

In the Media

The March 2022 issue of Entertainment Weekly arrives with a Q&A with Dolly Parton and James Patterson about their new collaborative novel, Run, Rose, Run (Little, Brown, & Co.), and album project. There is a feature on the upcoming season 2 of Bridgerton. The “Must List” includes The World Cannot Give by Tara Isabella Burton (S. & S.), Step by Bloody Step by Si Spurrier, Matias Bergara, and Matheus Lopes (Image Comics), and Run Towards the Danger: Confrontations with a Body of Memory by Sarah Polley (Penguin Pr.). Other book coverage includes reviews of Comedy Comedy Comedy Drama by Bob Odenkirk (Random), which earns a B-. Also, Booth by Karen Joy Fowler (Putnam), and Eleutheria by Allegra Hyde (Vintage: PRH), both of which earn a B. Plus, All My Rage by Sabaa Tahir (Razorbill), which earns a B+. 

The People "Picks" book of the week is Wildcat by Amelia Morris (Flatiron). Also getting attention are Black American Refugee: Escaping the Narcissism of the American Dream by Tiffanie Drayton (Viking), and The Boy with a Bird in His Chest by Emme Lund (Atria). “New Thrillers” include: The Violin Conspiracy by Brendan Slocumb (Anchor), Greenwich Park by Katherine Faulkner (Gallery), and Unmissing by Minka Kent (Thomas & Mercer). Plus, the “Audio Pick” is The Christie Affair by Nina de Gramont (St. Martin’s).

The “Picks” section spotlights Marry Me, based on the graphic novel by Bobby Crosby, on Peacock and in theaters. Ringo Starr looks back on The Beatles in a new book, LIFTED: Images and Memories In My Life with the Beatles From Across The Universe (Julien’s Auctions). Plus, chefs Kelsey Barnard Clark, Southern Grit: 100+ Down-Home Recipes for the Modern Cook (Chronicle Books), and Gordon Ramsay, Ramsay in 10 (Grand Central), give cooking tips.

Reviews

USA Today reviews The Dark Queens: The Bloody Rivalry That Forged the Medieval World by Shelley Puhak (Bloomsbury), giving it 3.5 out of 4 stars; “Fans of historical narrative – as well as Game of Thrones (whose Cersei Lannister was likely inspired by Fredegund) – will find enjoyment here, as well as a new perspective on the forces that shaped this tumultuous era.”

NYT reviews Burning Questions by Margaret Atwood (Doubleday): “Atwood, at 82, hardly seems ossified. She’s radiant on this book’s cover, and the best pieces here cast a certain glow as well. As for the speeches, I suppose during those you can, as at any conference, sneak out to the sidewalk for an illicit vape."  Also, The Lords of Easy Money: How the Federal Reserve Broke the American Economy by Christopher Leonard (S. & S.): “The office politics of the Fed are well captured by Leonard, as is the intimidating physical setting." And, Life Between the Tides: Life Between the Tides by Adam Nicolson (FSG; LJ starred review): "The notion of dredging big truths from small pools isn’t novel; Steinbeck urged readers 'to look from the tide pool to the stars and then back to the tide pool again.' But few writers have done it with Nicolson’s discursive erudition." And, Life Without Children by Roddy Doyle (Viking): “All the stories in Life Without Children have a quality of suspended animation, as though the music has suddenly stopped and the characters are left, each alone, on the dance floor…” Plus, Insurgency: How Republicans Lost Their Party and Got Everything They Ever Wanted by Jeremy W. Peters (Crown): “The book contains too many examples of Trump’s manifest flaws to appeal to MAGA true believers, but not enough revelations of outright criminality to satisfy veterans of the #resistance.” Lastly, The Founders: The Story of Paypal and the Entrepreneurs Who Shaped Silicon Valley by Jimmy Soni (S. & S.): "Soni, the co-author of previous books about the mathematician Claude Shannon and Julius Caesar’s enemy Cato, is balanced and fluid in this solo outing, making mundane projects like the creation of an online “button,” or the dawn of CAPTCHA, somehow literary, comparing PayPal’s tale, improbably but effectively, to Dickens and the Bloomsbury group."

NPR reviews Scoundrel: How a Convicted Murderer Persuaded the Women Who Loved Him, the Conservative Establishment, and the Courts To Set Him Free by Sarah Weinman (Ecco; LJ starred review): “it's clear that Weinman tried to breathe as much life into the women as she could, and the book certainly excels at being an in-depth exploration of how outside influence and support can affect the criminal justice system's slow-moving cogs, as well as the narrative of a con artist who managed to hurt a great deal of people.”

The Washington Post reviews The Stone World by Joel Agee (Melville House): "An exquisite meditation upon language, meaning, human longing and consciousness itself, Stone World will fill readers with wonder."

LA Times reviews Life Without Children by Roddy Doyle (Viking): “provides evidence that the short story, with its contained scope and drive, is the best way to convey how intensely individuals have struggled with COVID-19 and its global ramifications.”

Briefly Noted

At the Atlantic, Jennifer Senior chats with Margaret Atwood, Burning Questions (Doubleday), about envy in friendship and friendship in old age.

Salon talks with Laura Coates, Just Pursuit: A Black Prosecutor's Fight for Fairness (S. & S.), about “why conservatives fear empowered Black women within the justice system.”

George R.R. Martin's Wild Cards series will be released as a Marvel comic this summer. Entertainment Weekly has the story.

NYT writes about “The Pandemic Plot,” and how literary novelists are incorporating Covid into their work.

USA Today picks five books for the week.

CrimeReads suggests 10 books out this week.

Angie Thomas, Jason Mott, and more recommend 10 books by other Black authors at Entertainment Weekly.

Vulture has “8 Great Audiobooks to Listen to This Month.”

OprahDaily shares “13 Groundbreaking Toni Morrison Works to Read Right Now.”

The Millions previews notable new releases for the week.

The Guardian rounds up the best thrillers of the month.

Authors On Air

NPR’s Fresh Air talks with Erich Schwartzel, Red Carpet: Hollywood, China, and the Global Battle for Cultural Supremacy (Penguin Pr.), about Hollywood’s relationship with China and the future of movies.

Marc Brown reflects on the end of the Arthur Series at the NYT. 

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